Deny, deny, deny

I am led to wonder lately how it is we can present ourselves as the leaders of the ‘free’ world when we live in such denial. Now, each of us lives in personal denial of one thing or another – we really do need to exercise, we really do need to find a  new job, we really do need to take better control of our lives, etc. – but that’s just part of being human. We should and can always be better in regards to self-realization and self-reclamation. 

We can always do better by ourselves and others. 

The thing is though that it’s not the moment of not actualizing ourselves that is the problem but our unwillingness to actualize and accept one another. 

What sort of message does it send to the world that we won’t allow people to declare who they are because it’s ‘political’. 

No it’s not, it’s personal. 

We MADE it political. 

No, we LET it get political. 

We let people weaponize identity so that if you aren’t White and straight you are Wrong and need to be silenced. Go back to the days of casual jokes about how ‘it wasn’t Adam and STEVE it was Adam and EVE’ and the idea that darn it, the Bible tells us that being gay is bad. 

Something that it doesn’t. 

It may refer to things in terms of procreation but, well, that’s just science – for now – not judgment. 

WE put the judgment on it. 

We did. 

We decided it was a sin to ‘lay with another of the whatever and such’. 

We did that. 

And we keep doing it. 

I have hammered this point before but it’s true – it’s 2022 and we STILL have issue with people being gay.
WHAT?

We act as if this is a new thing. 

WHY are people ‘out and proud’? Well, maybe because we got to a point culturally where they thought they didn’t have to live in fear any longer – the fools! – or that they didn’t have to hide anymore. They saw the violence and the murder in the past. 

They saw how people had to hide who they were in the past and how miserable they were. 

For God’s sake, George Eliot had to pretend to be a man just to get her work published and popular. 

THAT is who we were and to a degree, who we still are. 

We don’t accept people as they are. 

We never have. 

We live in a state of such deep denial that we deny ourselves. 

How many people have to be beaten, or bullied, killed, or have to kill themselves until we just let them live. 

‘Well there’s so many trans people now!’ 

Again, because they foolishly thought they didn’t have to hide any longer. 

Enter Trumpism and the Christian Cult. 

They SHOULDN’T have to hide. 

The idea that there are SUDDENLY gay and trans predators (when they were never a problem before) out there trying to turn kids (LIKE VAMPIRES!) and seduce them is crazy. It’s fantasy. 

It’s a creepy, weird, suburban fantasy. 

It’s nonsense boogeyman stuff meant to scare people into the ballot box. 

It’s not political. 

It’s social, sure, but we want to turn everything political now. 

OH, YOU’RE MAKING IT POLITICAL!

No, YOU are by denying people the freedom to be themselves. 

I am sorry but the fact is that there are more public displays of affection from hetero folks than gay. And ya know what, as long as they aren’t mauling one another or going at it in public, who cares who is kissing whom?

Really?
We don’t have better things to worry about?

Like freaking climate change?

Oh wait, we’re in denial about that too. 

Oh, that’s just a minor readjustment of the earth. 

Sure it is. 

This readjustment will just kill our species out is all. 

No big. 

YOU’RE MAKING IT POLITICAL!

There’s a point now where yeah, everything is political. That’s the world we have let be built around us, like the walls of a prison. 

You can’t just say ‘we need to fix the environment so we don’t all die’ because to too many greedy monsters that sounds like – we’re going to take away your side piece money and make you broke. Not that there weren’t ways to do this before now, ways to start heading things off before we had to do drastic things, but that’s life, isn’t it? We won’t do the hard things because we’d rather deny them to keep living our best lives. 

Our best lies.  

And let’s talk about the kids. 

Why do we think we need to shelter our kids so much?

Do you think they aren’t seeing the real world through TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, Telegram, or whatever?

Really?

On TV?

In movies?

In music?

Do you want to control THAT much of your kids?

Are you that crazy?

Haven’t we already learned that the more we hide things from kids the more they want it?

Haven’t we seen that if we don’t explain things they’ll find out themselves?

Oh, sure, you can indoctrinate them, you can teach them to hate people of color and differing lifestyles and sexualities and identities but hate doesn’t pay many bills. 

Hate doesn’t do much but make you miserable and scared. 

How many happy supremacists do you see these days?

How many smiling Nazis do you see?

How many thrilled QAnon folks out there?

They derive their joy from hate and from spreading it, and that’s it. 

What would happen if they got what they wanted?

Got the crazed White Christian America?

They’d just start wanting to go to war with everyone who wasn’t us. 

They’d find other boogeymen. 

Imagine for a moment that what you do, what you love, how you love, and who you love were denied you. 

That who you are is not who you are allowed to be. 

Imagine that. 

Some may not need to. 

But try if that’s not the case. 

What would you do?

Why wouldn’t you want to die if you were never allowed to be true to yourself and  your heart?

And yet that’s what we expect of people. 

Hide who you are so I don’t have to deal with it. 

Hide who you are so my kid doesn’t have to learn about the world. 

Hide who you are so I can pretend you don’t exist. 

That’s who we are. 

It’s who we’ve always been. 

Denial. 

We deny others because we deny ourselves and the things that may make us happy. 

We’d rather live in a lie than accept that maybe, just maybe there are more ways to live than the way we live. 

We deny everyone because what if what we believe isn’t right?

The world falls apart. 

So sure, let’s keep denying ourselves and our country people, let’s deny, deny, deny and maybe we’ll all just watch the world burn together and hold hands at the end. 

See, love still wins!

…c…